Chicago-based Cards Against Humanity doles out pieces of Maine island

Nancy Stone, Chicago Tribune

Max Temkin, one of the founders of Cards Against Humanity, works around a crowded table in November to get a site launched for a holiday fundraiser. Cards is hosting an aldermanic debate for 2nd Ward candidates on Sunday.

Max Temkin, one of the founders of Cards Against Humanity, works around a crowded table in November to get a site launched for a holiday fundraiser. Cards is hosting an aldermanic debate for 2nd Ward candidates on Sunday. (Nancy Stone, Chicago Tribune)

A quarter of a million participants in a Chicago game-maker's holiday fundraising campaign can now lay claim to small pieces of an island in Maine that the company bought this year and renamed "Hawaii 2," according to Max Temkin, a co-creator of the popular party game Cards Against Humanity.

The company, which was formed by a group of Highland Park High School friends, got the 6-acre island in Lake St. George for about $200,000, Temkin said Sunday evening.

Cards Against Humanity, which plans to publicize the island deal Monday, raised the money by offering to send 250,000 people 10 mystery packages in exchange for $15 as part of a holiday-themed publicity stunt. The surprise parcels included a copy of a new board game called Slap.45, a packet of "Miracle Berries" tablets that are supposed to inhibit bitter and sour taste receptors, and legal paperwork for a license to 1 square foot of "Hawaii 2," formerly called Birch Island.

"We wanted to do something big," Temkin said. "We thought about trying to launch something into space, or doing something visible from space. Eventually that led us down the path of buying a private island, which is something we've joked about in the past."

In a letter to participants, Cards Against Humanity described the island as wooded and uninhabited. The participants must follow local and state laws and cannot damage or cut down any trees.

"If you hurt a tree on the Private Island, we will curse your family for a thousand (1,000) generations," according to the license agreement that Cards Against Humanity sent to the participants.

Otherwise, Temkin said, they can use their square foot of land as they see fit — "whatever they can do in a square foot."

Through the license agreement, the participants will not have to maintain or pay taxes on their slivers of land, according to Temkin, who said that in practice they will be able to use the island as a shared space for "nondestructive, recreational purposes."

Cards Against Humanity is the No. 1 selling game on Amazon and was created by a group of Highland Park High School alumni. Uncharted Books in Chicago's Logan Square neighborhood hosted a game night and Cards Against

Cards Against Humanity is the No. 1 selling game on Amazon and was created by a group of Highland Park High School alumni. Uncharted Books in Chicago's Logan Square neighborhood hosted a game night and Cards Against

According to Cards Against Humanity's letter to participants, the company bought the island for the following reasons: "1) Because it was funny, and 2) so we could give you a small piece of it. Also, 3) we're preserving a pristine bit of American wilderness."

The company also contributed $250,000 raised through the campaign to the Washington, D.C.-based Sunlight Foundation, which promotes transparency in government.

"(Government transparency) is not a sexy political issue and it often gets overlooked," Temkin said.

In Cards Against Humanity, a designated Card Czar has a stack of cards printed with an innocuous fill-in-the-blank sentence or a question. The players, armed with cards of their own that are printed with a random word or phrase, must then offer up their best answer — often the most ridiculous or disgusting combination.

This year's holiday campaign revolved around Kwanzaa, while a similar publicity stunt last year was pegged to Christmas and included such surprise shipments as a lump of Pennsylvania anthracite coal and a customized Cards Against Humanity card with the recipient's name printed on it.